Google May Knee Cap Domain Tasting

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Google is said to be considering banning newly registered domain names from participating in the Google for Domain Names program, severely hampering the practice of domain tasting.

According to Jay Westerdal at Domain Tools, Google would block all domains if they are less then five days old. In Jay’s words, “This potential new policy change by Google could stop all Domain Tasting in its tracks.”

Domain tasting, for those not familiar with it, is the practice of registrants using the five-day grace period at the beginning of a domain registration to test the marketability of a domain name (full Wikipedia entry here).

I’m a little hesitant in suggesting that Google’s move will completely wipe out domain testing, because there are no shortage of alternative advertising programs for domains, however Westerdal is heavily involved in the industry, and he would suggest that Google is where most domain tasters are generating revenue:

It was disclosed in court that one partner that Google had was generating as much as $3 million dollars a month from the practice and that was after Google’s revenue share. Oversee.net and other companies have been using this practice for years and it will have a direct impact on them. The gravy train of free money might be coming to a halt very fast. This policy change at Google should be announced to the channel partners soon and it will have a huge echoing impact on the Industry….I think this is a return of the “Be Good” motto Google had a few years ago. Google has been quietly enabling this practice for years now. This is a smart policy move on Google’s part to ward off impending litigation that might have hit them in the coming months.

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CrunchBase

OverviewGoogle is a multinational corporation that is specialized in internet-related services and products. The company’s product portfolio includes Google Search, which provides users with access to information online; Knowledge Graph that allows to search for things, people, or places as well as builds systems recognizing speech and understanding natural language; Google Now, which provides information …